Note: A placement exam will be required when you arrive on site.

Advanced

This course is designed for students who have completed or tested out of a minimum of four semesters (or six quarters) of college-level Spanish. However, students must take a placement exam to determine the course level into which they will be able to enroll.

The Advanced level course is 90 contact hours and consists of two 45-hour modules. Module I, or the Intensive Course, is an intensive 15-day Spanish course taken at the beginning of the program. Once completed, the students will move on to Module II of the advanced level, which is a 45-hour non-intensive course lasting the final 12 weeks of the program.

ADVANCED LEVEL

1. Objectives

1.1. The capacity of communication

-Be able of understand the main ideas of complex texts that try concrete subjects as well as abstract, even if they are theoretical, always keeping them into the same specialization field
-Be able to mix with native speakers with sufficient fluency degree and spontaneity, in a way that the communication is held without interlocutors effort
-Be able to produce clear and detailed texts on different subjects, such as support a point of view on general issues, pointing the pros and cons of the different possibilities

1.2.- Linguistic competences

-Express oneself clearly and without the need of narrowing the content of the message
-Have enough linguistic elements in order to make clear descriptions, express points of view, and develop arguments using complex sentences without the need of searching for words to construct the speech
-Have a wide vocabulary on relative matters of one’s own speciality, and on more general subjects. Be able to vary the formulation of the messages to avoid constant repetition, even if lexical deficiencies produce vacillation and evasive discourse
-Manifest a high lexical precision, even if some mistakes that don’t stand in the way of communication occur in the selection of words
-Manifest a good grammar control, even if there is an eventual presence of a slip-up, non systematic mistakes and small and rare errors in the structure of the sentence, and retrospectively corrected
-Pronounce and modulate clearly and naturally

Contents

2.1. Notions and functions

-Pass on (and ask someone to transmit as well) in formations, instructions, petitions, assignments and orders
-Corroborate and deny other’s statements
-Ask, concede and deny permission
-Express (and ask for):
--Wishes and necessities
--Intentions, conditions and objectives
--Agreement and disagreement, total or partial
-Justify, support, criticize and defend opinions, proposals and ideas
-Manifest (and react accordingly)
--complaints, claims and desires
--astonishment, happiness, sorrow, deception
--love, concern, resignation
--gratitude and apologies
-Make promises
-Make conjectures, express possibility and impossibility
-Express different degrees of certainty and probability
-Advise and react before an advise
-Prevent, recommend and advert; react adequately
-Refer to customs and personal habits and collectives
-Tell anecdotes and historic events
-Describe changes in life or in the personality of someone

2.2.- Grammar

2.2.1.- Morphology

-Composition and derivation (substantives, adjectives, verbs and adverbs):
--Characteristics of prefixation, suffixation and Spanish composition
--Rules of inflection of genre and number
-Qualifying adjectives:
--Position
--Semantic and stylistic values
-Particular use in the pronominal system and in the determination; personal pronouns, demonstratives, possessives, interrogatives y relatives.
-Different uses of quantifiers: numerals, ordinals, multiplicatives, distributives and collectives
-Groups of indefinites:
-The verb:
--Consolidation of the morphology of the different tenses and moods, and the systematization of the uses and contrasts between them. Particular cases
--Future and conditional in the expression of probability
--Different uses of the indefinite and the gerund and its compounds
--Reflexive verbs and pronominals
--Periphrasis: systematization and special cases
-Prepositional regime
-Values of the “se” pronoun: impersonality, reflex passive
-Adverbs in �"mente: discursive uses
-Conjunctions and coordination and subordination connectors associated to formal registers
-Spanish phrases (nominal, adjectives, verbal, adverbials)

2.2.2.- Syntax

-Systematization of the diverse structures in the subordinates, substantives
-Systematization in indirect style
-Relative sentences with preposition (en, con, sobre el/la/los/las que...), alternation que/quien
-Comparative constructions (es como / una especie de... + sustantivo; no tan... como...; mucho más... que...)
-Pronominal constructions (acordarse de, interesarse por) and syntactic alternative (interesarle algo a alguien / interesarse alguien por algo)
-Subordinate sentences (of cause, concessive, conditional, temporal, and final): systematization of the syntactic constructions and the use of the less frequent conjunctions.

2.3.- Vocabulary

Position and movement
Clothing and attire
Physical aspect
Gestures and postures
Travel (transport, baggage, incidents, etc.)
Geography, climate, and nature; animals
Social subjects and vindications, social collectives
Personal and affective relations
Political environment (organization and debate themes)
Labor environment (jobs, labor regulations, etc. )
Alimentary and industrial products
Cultural habits and values
Intellectual qualities and personal abilities; moral qualities
Reactions and behaviors
Academic life, exams and tests